Retaining mechanism for slidable doors



April 29, 1969 R. G. GLEJF ET Al- RETAINING MECHANISM FOR SLIDABLE DOORSFiled Aug. 5, 1966 senrGLeJF Genese. A. O'BRIEN MM, VJQLGMMM AT1-vs,

United States Patent O 3,441,076 RETAINING MECHANISM FOR SLIDABLE DOORSRobert G. Glejf and George A. OBrien, Chicago, Ill., as-

signors to Kinkead Industries Incorporated, Chicago, Ill., a corporationof Illinois Filed Aug. 5, 1966, Ser. No. 570,522 Int. Cl. Ed .75/26,17/00 U.S. Cl. 160-196 2 Claims ABSTRACT 0F THE DISCLOSURE Thisinvention relates to a detent mechanism for releasably retaining foldingslidable doors at predetermined positions along their path of travel andin a collapsed condition at one end. More particularly, the inventionpertains to a retaining mechanism for such doors which is capable ofaccommodating vertical misalignment between the slid-able door and itsmounting rails without binding when the doors are moved.

An important problem which is frequently encountered with sliding doorsis that of binding or sticking when the door is pulled or pushed out ofits normal alignment. This problem is especially acute in the case ofcollapsing segmented flexible doors, such as shower doors, which aremore prone to such misalignment. For such doors, these problems .areeliminated through the use of a resilient suspension las described inU.S. Patent No. 3,102,581, Mounting Structure for Slidable Doors, issuedto George A. Kochanowski on Sept. 3, 1963. Briey, this structurecomprises a slidable door which is resiliently suspended between rails,whereby when the door is pushed or pulled incorrectly, the tonces whichwould normally cause binding yare absorbed, Iand the Vdoor remains onthe rails. vIn .prior constructions, the glide members engaging therails were urged into binding engagement by this motion, but in theKochanowski mechanism .the forces are absorbed by .the resilient glidestructure, which yields to prevent binding of the glides- When the forcetending to cause misalignment is removed, the resilient structurereturns the door to its normal position.

It may be seen that this door construction is especially suited toshower stalls as are often constructed in existing bathtub installationsby the addition of a lshower head and an enclosure. With suchinstallations, i-t is desirable that the user be able to gain entranceor exit from either end of the tub, thereby requiring that the slidabledoor be freely movable from one end of its travel to the other, and notbe permanently attached to one end of the enclosure. However, in orderto maintain an adequate seal against spray and moist-ure, it isnecessary that the door be securely retained at both ends while theshower is in use. Yet when the user wishes to enter or leave the shower,the door must be easily openable from either end, and from both insideand outside of the shower enclosure.

With such slidable doors, it is desirable to provide a means by whichthe individual panels may be gathered and retained at one end of thetravel path. In the case of multi-paneled doors comprising segments ofcollapsible plastic, the natural resilience of the door segments tendsto resist the gathering and forces the door closed unless a positivemeans of gathering and retaining the MIce door together is provided.Such a mechanism must be simple, positive in action, and able toaccommodate the door misalignment encountered lin normal use andaccommodated by the previously-mentioned Kochanowski mounting structure.

Previous door retaining devices have not been able to meet theserequirements. Mechanica-l latches have been used, but these generallyhave the disadvantage of being openable from only one side, making itimpossible for a user to actua-te the latch if he is standing on theopposite side. Mechanical latches of the conventional door-latchconstrue-tion are also bulky, and have moving parts which present hardedges and protrusions which are likely to catch the users clothing. Inthe case of multi-panel flexible shower doors of the kind contemplatedby `the present invention, the panels must be maintained undercompression when the door is in its folded position, and -to accomplishthis with a conventional mechanical latch requires an extension of theleading panel which can reach back and behind the collapsed flexiblesections to engage the door frame and hold the door in compression. Sucha mechanism is beset with all the undesirable features mentioned above.

Another type `of door-retaining mechanism utilizes self-attractingmagnetic inserts, However, these latches require that the matingsurfaces of the door be accurately aligned in order to bring themagnetic inserts into engagement, and the door can be positivelyretained only in the fully-closed position, and not Aat someintermediate point. In order to gather the sections of a multi-paneleXible door of the type herein contemplated, a magnetic latch isgenerally unusable because there is no way by which the leading panelcan be retained to the door frame in order to hold the exible panels incompression.

`It is therefore a primary object of the present invention to provide aretaining mechanism for slidable doors which will releasably retain-aslidable door in a predetermined posi-tion along the path of slidingmovement. Another related object is to provide a door-retainingmechanism of the above description for slidable doors which is capableof Vaccommodating misal-ignment between the door and its rails duringoperation, while maintaining positive, yet releasable retention force.

Another object is to .provide a retaining mechanism of the abovedescription which is capable of retaining the compressed panels of amulti-panel eXible sliding door in a collapsed position at apredetermined location along the path sliding movement.

A further object is to provide a mechanism of the above descriptionwhich allo-ws a collapsible multi-panel iiexible sliding door to beopened from either end of its sliding movement and collapsed into alfolded condition at either end of its sliding movement.

A further object is to provide a mechanism of the above descriptionwhich is simple, sturdy, compact and inexpensive, while being resistantto rust nad not requiring the application of oil or grease duringservice.

Other objects and advantages of the invention will become apparent uponreading the following detailed description and upon reference to thedrawings, in which:

FIGURE 1 is a rear elevation of a partly collapsed flexible sliding doorassembly such as would be utilized in a bathroom shower stall orbathtub;

FIG. 2 is an enlarged fragmentary section taken in the plane 2 2 ofFIGURE 1;

FIG. 3 is a fragmentary section of the latc-h plunger of FIG. 2 showingdisplacement during door misalignment;

FIG. 4 is a perspective of the end of a door panel strip, showing theglide mechanism and latch mechanism of the present invention with thecover plate removed;

FIG. 5 is a reduced section taken in the plane 5 5 of FIG. 2, in whichthe slidable door is illustrated in a collapsed condition as retained bythe mechanism of the present invention; and

FIG. 6 is a perspective of an insert strip as employed in the guide railof FIG. 5.

While the invention will be described in conection with a preferredembodiment, it will be understood that we do not intend to limit theinvention to that embodiment, but intend to cover all alternatives,equivalents and modifications as may be included within the spirit andscope of the invention as dened by the appended claims.

Turning to the drawings, FIG. 1 illustrates a slidable door embodyingthe retaining mechanism of the present invention. This door isespecially suitable for use as a bathtub or shower door, beingconstructed of multiple panels 10 of flexible plastic material joined toone another `by rigid connecting strips 11. Each connecting strip 11 isheld in guide rails 12 by glides 13 which are preferably constructed toaccommodate lateral misalignment of the door structure to preventbinding and sticking, as with Kochanowski construction previouslymentioned. With this door construction, as many flexible panels 10 anddoor strips 11 are assembled as are needed to till the space betweendoor frames 15 when the door is in the extended condition. For maximumconvenience, the door should be openable from either end. The door maybe then simply collapsed accordion-fashion in either direction to enablethe user to gain access to the area, shower stall or other enclosure.The flexible panels 10 are folded and collapsed until the individualdoor strips 11 touch one another, as is best shown in FIG. 5. In thisconfiguration, the door structure is collapsed to its minimum width, andthe collapsed door may be slid to eiher end of the guide rails 12, asthe operator desires.

To accomplish these functions, the door is provided with a leading panelstrip 16 at each end, and this strip may be provided with a handle (notshown) on each side for convenience in grasping. As a feature of theinvention, the retaining mechanism which allows the door to be retainedin position is located at the ends of the terminal panel strips, ratherthan at the center as has often been the practice heretofore. Thisallows the handle, if provided, to be constructed without provisions forlatches, gates, and other mechanical retaining devices. By theelimination of such devices, sharp and protruding edges are avoided andsafety to the user is enhanced.

According to the invention, the door is held in the desired position bya captive spring-loaded plunger 17 mounted at the end of each leadingpanel strip 16 and slidable in top and bottom rail channels 18 in whichprotrusions or ridges 20 are provided at predetermined locations. Eachplunger 17 is resiliently urged outward by a spring 21 into engagementwith the adjacent channel 1S. Each plunger is preferably retained by ahousing 22 so that the limit of its outward extension is just short ofcontact with the bottom of the adjacent channel 18, while still beingsuflicient to contact the ridges 20. It may therefore be seen that thechannels 18 are interrupted by the ridges 20 to comprise a series ofco-linear elongate slots in each of which the plungers 17 may freelyride, while the resilience of the plunger mountings allows the terminalpanel strips 16 to ride over the ridges 2t) into the next slot if pulledwith sucient force to compress the springs 21.

The ridges 20 are preferably located at the ends of the allowable doortravel in both the top and bottom rails so that the door may be latchedinto position at both ends when extended so as to entirely close theshower enclosure. Alternatively, additional ridges 20 may be provided ashort distance `from the ends of the door travel (see FIG. 1) to allowthe leading panel strips 16 to be selectively retained at some positionshort of the completely closed configuration. This arrangement allowsthe door to be collapsed and gathered together at either end of itstravel, with the leading panel strip 16 nearest the frame 15 beingretained by one pair of ridges, while the other leading 4 panel strip 16is retained by an adjoining pair of ridges at the same end as shown inFIG. 5. The door is thus releasably retained in its collapsed positionand the resilience of the llexible door panel strips 10 cannot cause thedoor to spring out.

In carrying out the invention, each plunger 17 is captively retainedwithin its housing 22 and urged outward by a spring 21, as has beendescribed. Taking a single plunger assembly as typical of the others,the outward extension of the plunger is limited by a shoulder 23 on oneside of the plunger 17 which engages the housing 22. As an additionalfeature of the invention, the plunger 17 ts through an opening 25 in thehousing 22 that closely embraces the sides of the plunger but is deeperthan the plunger thickness. This allows the plunger 17 a limited freedomof movement in the vertical direction in addition to the in-and-outmovement accommodated by the spring 21. This has the advantage ofallowing the plunger 17 to track correctly in the channel 18 in spite ofvertical misalignment of the terminal strips 16 during operation of thedoor. With a door construction as disclosed by Kochanowski, mentionedpreviously, each glide 13 has glide rollers 26 which are resilientlysupported and allow limited vertical freedom of movement to accommodatemisalignment. Therefore, the plunger 17 is similarly shiftable in orderto track smoothly and accurately in cooperation with the movement of theresiliently supported glide rollers 26.

As is best shown in FIG. 3, the shoulder 23 is provided on only one sideof the plunger 17 and housing 22. On the opposite side of the plunger17, a beveled surface 27 is provided which allows the plunger 17 to riseand fall as may be necessary to accommodate misalignment of the leadingpanel strips 16, while retaining resiliency in the in-and-out directionas provided by the spring 21. When the misalignment is relieved, therestoring force of the spring 21 tends to urge the plunger 17 into theposition illustrated in FIG. 2, with its shoulder 23 again in engagementwith the corresponding surface of the plunger housing 22.

In the preferred construction, the ridges 20 are provided atpredetermined locations along the channels 18 in the guide rails 12 bymeans of a length of strip material 31 in which the ridges 20 areembossed. Because the guide rails 12 are commonly constructed ofaluminum extrusions, this construction is facilitated by the provisionof an additional slot 32 in the guide rails 12 at the bottom of thegroove 18 in which the plunger 17 rides, The ridges 20 may then belocated at any desired position along the guide rails 12 by the simpleexpedient of sliding the strip 31 along the slot 32 until it reaches thedesired position. In this way, the door-retaining mechanism of thepresent invention may be utilized in sliding door installations of anydesired length merely by cutting the guide rails 12 to length andinserting a suitablyformed strip 31 into each end.

We claim as our invention:

1. A door assembly comprising, in combination, a rail having a recessedchannel, a resiliently collapsible door having opposite endsindependently slidable on said rail so that the door can be collapsed ateither end of the rail or opened to extend substantially the length ofthe rail, a resiliently supported plunger mounted at each end of thedoor `adjacent the channel with said plungers being urged into slidingrelationship with the channel, and means defining four spaced ridges insaid channel against which said plungers are detentably retained, saidridges being disposed in pairs at each end of the channel with one ridgeof each pair being positioned at the extreme end of door travel, and theother ridge of each pair being spaced therefrom by a distance notexceeding the collapsed length of said door, whereby the door may bealternately retained in the fully extended, partially extended, or fullycollapsed positions at each end of the rail.

2. A door assembly comprising, in combination, a rail member, a slidabledoor panel member guided by the rail member and retained thereto byglides, said glides being resiliently and movably retained by the doorpanel member to accommodate misalignment between the door panel memberand the rail member, said rail member having a recessed channel alignedalong the sliding path of the door panel member and having a retainingridge positioned therein, a detent plunger housing rigidly carried -bythe door panel member, and a resiliently supported detent plungercaptively retained by the housing for resilient detenting movementagainst said ridge, said plunger being extendable from the housingthrough an opening which closely embraces the sides of the plunger andloosely retains the plunger for limited freedom of vertical movementsubstantially equal to the vertical misalignment accommodated by saidresiliently retained glides, whereby the plunger is enabled to freelyfollow the channel during misalignment of the door panel and railmembers.

References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS DENNIS L. TAYLOR, PrimaryExaminer.

U.S. Cl. X.R. 160-201

